Love in the Time of Cholera

I've done it! I've completed a novel! I'm so happy!!! It has taken me a really, really long time, as in months. But I'm blaming the move to some extent.

This is the story of two young people, Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza, who fall in love through the exchange of love letters in their youth. Their union is foiled by Fermina's father and their paths separate as Fermina marries Doctor Urbino, whilst Florentino remains single (although having numerous love affairs - including one with his underage god daughter - how come no-one ever mentions this?!!! Not OK!). Right at the beginning of the book, we are aware that Fermina becomes a widow, so the book whilst going right back to the character's childhoods, is a torturous journey towards finding out whether the two manage to get together. This is my first Marquez novel (I was surprised by the underage thing mentioned above) and his use of description was stunning and his characters are well rounded (the main three) and he is able to capture something of the time - I think. I will be reading at least one more of his novels at some point, and I'm looking forward to it.

Quilting Update

Excuse the pile of unsorted laundry on the bed, but I felt like an update was sorely needed and this was the only picture that I had available. Once upon a time the aim was to get this quilt completed by Christmas but that is not going to happen. I had a schedule mapped out on my phone and everything! Broken down into completing 2 or three jigsaw pieces and sewing them onto the main quilt every week. I'm lucky if I get one done.

We've moved into our new house and I'm still unpacking boxes and trying to make it feel like home. I have a few boxes to go but we're almost there. It looks like home but has yet to feel like it.

As for the quilt, I'm one or two jigsaw pieces off being three quarters of the way done in terms of assembling the patchwork top piece. It's looking good and the colours are quite calming. I've noticed a couple of mistakes where a little piece of fabric which should be on the back has made its way to the front. I've managed to tuck these in and will just have to be careful to make sure that this is sewn in when it comes to actually quilting the top. In this photo, the quilt top is draped over a double bed. In terms of width, it just fits on top with no extra fabric to go over the sides. Length wise, there won't be a problem. I'm still surprised at how big the twin size is! I thought it would be considerably smaller. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it means that it can be used in more situations and comfortably cover different beds, but it does mean that it is taking a while to complete. And in the meantime, I have two more on the back burner - fabric bought for one, colour inspiration chosen for the other but I haven't bought the fabric yet.

Half way to a completed quilt top

Ok, this photo is one jigsaw piece away from being half way through, but it now is half way through to having a completed quilt top. The quilt seems bigger than I was expecting it to be, given that it is a twin size, but that's probably a good thing.

This is a picture of the back of the quilt, which I strangely like. I often think that when you hold up a quilt to the light, they look better the long way round, when you can see the folds and joins and the double layer of fabric.

I'm still really pleased with how this is coming along. It's looking good. But it's about to really slow down. We're moving house and I'm too exhausted to keep sewing during the night. So who knows when I'll manage to complete it. I'll probably miss it and have to carry on in the odd minutes that the little Miss lets me. Typically I can hear that she has just woken up and is cooing quite happily in her cot, so I've got a little bit of time before I need to go and attend to her. If I were sewing, that would equate to a few more centimetres of stitches. But I need to cut more fabric and that involves finding my cutting mat and rotary cutter so at the moment I'm a little bit stuck.

A quarter of the way

I was sewing until just after midnight last night and realised that I have sewn up a quarter of this quilt. At least I think I'm a quarter of the way there. I've sewn 14 out of 56 jigsaw pieces along with the surrounding edge pieces. It's the edge pieces that make the calculation complicated. It's looking good but I'm now worried that I haven't got enough fabric. Diamonds take up a lot more fabric than triangles and squares and I hadn't really realised that before I started. I've been online and to the fabric shop today to stock up. 

The Crying of Lot 49

The entry in my list of 1000 novels reads - WTF? followed by the date. Given that this is a really short novel, this should have been a quick read. Or at least I think it should have been. Maybe its my post pregnancy brain, maybe its my complete lack of knowledge of Greek mythology but I had no idea of what was going on. The story follows a woman who suddenly becomes the executor of her ex-lover's will. In order to fulfill her duty she has to move into a motel in a particular town and gets embroiled in a mystery that may or may not be a conspiracy. There are lots of references to LSD in the novel and it wouldn't surprise me if this novel had been written whilst heavily under the influence. You get the impression of images and ideas blurring into one, separating and then reconvening several pages later.

Playmat quilt for Alice

We have been on a couple of visits to family and I decided that I needed to make a mat for Alice to play on. We have a lovely baby gym thing that Alice absolutely loves, but that is not really portable. She loves her kicking time on that and has just started to roll over (look out world!). This means that she needs some time to kick about and let off some steam. I figured that if I could make a little mat then I can easily roll it up and take it with me to different places for her to have somewhere clean and slightly (really slightly) padded to play on.

We took this down to Cornwall for Alice to meet her great-grandad. It took me two afternoons to complete in total. The squares are from free charm packs that I have been keeping for years. I get them when I spend over a certain amount of money on my favourite fabric website. Fortunately the colours worked really well. I didn't particularly plan the layout of the quilt. I sorted the patches into colour groups, eg a yellow pile, blue pile, red pile etc. and then paired the colours, using the occasional white based square to break up big chunks of solid colours. I then just laid them out on the floor and played around with the layout for a few minutes, not thinking about it too much and going with instinct. I quilted it using free motion large swirls. Roughly one per square. The backing is a solid piece of fabric (1.5 metres was bought and I have a little strip left) that I cut so that there was an overhang of fabric that I then folded over the patchwork to create the binding.

I'm actually really pleased with how this turned out. I was ready to cut into my stash of fabric but the colours that I had actually worked. Charm packs are a real time saver! It made me realise how much time I spend just cutting fabric in comparison to sewing the quilts.

Designing the quilt

Whilst I have mapped out the quilt and therefore know how many diamonds I need, I haven't planned the exact placement of each fabric. I have created a washing line that stretches across our bookshelf and have been using this as a makeshift design wall. I realised that I would need to do some kind of planning because I want to limit the amount of orange that is in the quilt. The idea is that the orange diamonds add little pops of colour so I need to be careful that the diamonds are a) distributed well and b) not all facing the same direction. Hopefully by creating a bit of a design wall I can make sure that the eye will be drawn around the quilt rather than just to one particular area. 

In terms of an update: 9 jigsaw pieces are sewn together with extra pieces added to the surrounding areas to create the edge. One more jigsaw piece is sewn together but won't be added yet. I think I need to make several jigsaw pieces and play around with their placements before I attach them to the main part of the quilt. 

The Beach

I can't believe that I'm able to write a blog piece on a book. That is correct: a full novel. I finished it the other day, partly because its a page turner and partly because the Little Miss has started a little more of a routine, giving me a little more of a rhythm to the day.

The beach is the story of Richard, a gap year traveller who travels to Thailand. On arrival another traveler provides him with a map to an 'Eden' of a beach. Its a secret community who live there, hidden from view of 'the world'. There is a sinister undertone to both Richard and this community which means that you keep on wanting to turn the page to find out what happens.

Can't write more. She's just woken up. Good read, wouldn't read again as the tension wouldn't be there any more.

Progress on EPP

I've been working in my EPP project and laid out my 8 completed jigsaw pieces. I only have 10 templates left which means that I'm going to have to work out how to sew all of these pieces together in order to release more template pieces. I can already spot a potential problem as, having put the eight stars together I can see that I have some gaps. I need to think about what to do. Either I need to add a diamond to a jigsaw piece or I add the diamond separately. I also need to think about how to add the pieces to the sides/edges. 

A New Project - a new skill

So baby is eight weeks old today. In light of having mastered this parenting lark (ha ha - it's hard work!) I decided that I needed a new project. Enter another quilt - this time it's for my sister. 

She saw this art work by Steven Solis and we are using it as a basis for her quilt. We picked out the fabrics together and I will attempt to recreate it as much as possible. It will be a challenge as this piece was made out of recycled envelopes rather than fabric. Will do my best.

Another added challenge is that it requires a whole new skill - English paper piecing. Having scoured the internet looking for tutorials on how to create 60 degree diamond quilts using a machine, I gave up and settled on the fact that this was going to have to be my first EPP quilt. I found a very helpful video tutorial on how to do it, and started to cut out template diamonds out of cardboard and the plastic from plastic folders. In fact this is what I was doing when my contractions started. Foolish me to think that baby might be late and I might need a project to occupy me whilst waiting. 

So, two months in to being mum and I realise that I'm beginning to go stir crazy for the lack of being able to do anything for me or do anything productive around the house. So I'm trying to do little bits of sewing as and when I can. Actually this is quite a good project to do with a baby. I can sew whilst holding her in my lap if she's in a good position and I can pick it up and put it down easily. 

So far I have back stitched several diamonds and have completed my first star or puzzle piece. I'm quite pleased with my progress and am surprised at how easy I'm finding EPP. More updates to follow...

Triangle Quilt for My Baby Alice

I wasn't sure if I would ever get to make this particular quilt, so this one is a particular pleasure to share. I've enjoyed making quilts for other people but making one knowing it was for a little baby growing inside me and kicking away as I sat at the sewing machine was a joy! We didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl (turns out my bump contained a gorgeous girl) so we chose a gender neutral palate. Colours were chosen by my husband. I'm really pleased with the result, I think it looks quite circusy.

The quilt design is the same one I used for my niece, so it's nice to have a bit of a theme running in the family. 

I used lots of animal prints on the back of the quilt. My husband really likes owls and so when I found fabric with owls on it I knew that we had to use that in the quilt. It turned out to be quite blocky but I quite liked the effect. I think I can imagine looking for the fox or the blue owl with my daughter in the future. 

I completed this crib sized quilt in my 37th week of pregnancy - so I was cutting it fine! The project got decidedly trickier the bigger my bump became. In the end Baby Alice was born exactly on her due date.

The Last Empress

I finished this book on the morning of the 30th December. This is only significant because later on that night I started my contractions and gave birth to my beautiful daughter the next day. Just to be perfectly clear, however, this book did nothing towards helping my labour or even ensuring that my baby arrived bang on time! This information is just by the by...

The Last Empress is the follow on book fromEmpress Orchid and picks up where the last story left off. Orchid remains in charge of the country ruling in the stead of her son. It is more of a historical novel than a romance in comparison with the previous book and the author almost seems to be bogged down with ensuring that she includes historical details: a list of dates, who's who and cross referencing to Western press documents. As such it wasn't a particularly smooth read. It was interesting in so far as I am interested in how China moved from being a monarchy, but I feel that it didn't suit the author's writing style as much as the first novel did. Not a book I would read again.